Another difference between the mediæval seculars and the modern clergy is in the superior independence of the latter. The poor parochial chaplain was largely dependent for his means of living on the fees and offerings of his parishioners. The domestic chaplain was only an upper servant. Even the country incumbent, in those feudal days when the lord of the manor was a petty sovereign, was very much under the influence of the local magnate. In some primitive little villages, where the lord of the manor continues to be the sovereign of his village, it is still the fashion for the clergyman not to begin service till the squire comes. The Book of the Knight of La Tour Landry gives two stories which serve to show that the deference of the clergyman to the squire was sometimes carried to very excessive lengths in the old days of which we are writing. "I have herde of a knight and of a lady that in her youthe delited hem to rise late. And so they used longe, tille many tymes that thei lost her masse, and made other of her parisshe to lese it, for the knight was lorde and patron of the chirche, and therfor the priest durst not disobeye hym. And so it happed that on a Sunday the knight sent unto the chirche that thei shulde abide hym. And whane he come, it was passed none, wherfor thir might not that day have no masse, for every man saide it was passed tyme of the day, and therfor thei durst not singe. And so that Sunday the knight, the lady, and alle the parisshe was without masse, of the whiche the pepelle were sori, but thir must needs suffre." And on a night there came a vision to the parson, and the same night the knight and lady dreamed a dream. And the parson came to the knight's house, and he told him his vision, and the priest his, of which they greatly marvelled, for their dreams were like. "And the priest said unto the knight, 'There is hereby in a forest an holy ermyte that canne telle us what this avision menithe.' And than thei yede to hym, and tolde it hym fro point to point, and as it was. And the wise holi man, the which was of blessed lyff, expounded and declared her avision." The other story is of "a ladi that dwelled faste by the chirche, that toke every day so long time to make her redy that it made every Sunday the person of the chirche and the parisshenes to abide after her. And she happed to abide so longe on a Sunday that it was fer dayes, and every man said to other, 'This day we trow shall not this lady be kemed and arraied.'" * * * * *